Hope

This morning I woke to an unfamiliar sound.  It was not the yelling of children demanding breakfast, nor was it the static of my clock radio alarm.  It took a few minutes of careful listening to discern the notes of a bird's song.  It was the song of hope, that spring is around the corner.  Outside my bedroom window, the crocus bulbs that I patiently planted in the fall are blooming.  It's a great reminder of a truth I often forget: the world is about beauty.  Even when it is hidden in the darkness, it is growing, waiting to surprise us with life.

In the wintry seasons of life, it's hard to remember this truth, and much easier to buy the lie that the world is primarily darkness, death, and pain; that evil has conquered.  But I hold on to the hope that spring will come, that resurrection brings new life, and that the darkness is only marking time until the light dawns.